Page 27 of Forced Plus-Size Bride of the Bratva

I don’t test it.

He leads me through the hall in silence. Not dragging me, not even walking too close. Just enough to ensure I don’t disappear.

At the foot of the stairs, he pauses. “You shouldn’t have come this far,” he says, glancing back at me.

“Tell your boss to lock his doors better,” I snap.

He actually chuckles. Just once. It’s low and fleeting but real. “He did. You picked the lock.”

I look away.

We reach the hallway I recognize, and my heart sinks as we near the door. The one they assigned me. The one I hate.

Dima stops in front of it and opens it for me. Doesn’t push me in. Just gestures.

I hesitate. “Why are you being nice to me?”

He studies me for a beat longer. “Being cruel wouldn’t stop you.”

Then he turns and walks away.

The door closes behind me, and for the first time in what feels like hours, I’m alone again.

The room is still. Still too clean. Still too perfect. I sink onto the edge of the bed, staring at the door.

And I whisper into the silence, “I’m not done.”

Chapter Eight - Andrei

The tray in my hands barely makes a sound as I open the door.

The lights are low in her room—just a single lamp flickering near the bed—and for a moment, she doesn’t move. She sits upright, knees drawn to her chest, back straight despite the exhaustion that must be bleeding into every inch of her. Her eyes flick toward me the second I cross the threshold, but she doesn’t speak. Doesn’t lash out. Doesn’t run.

She’s learning.

Still, that fire in her hasn’t dimmed. It’s there, behind the guarded set of her jaw and the way her hands fist into the blanket at her side. A defense. A warning. Even as she trembles, even as her breaths come too shallow, too quiet, she refuses to look afraid.

I like that. The struggle. The resistance. The way she tries so hard to pretend that she hasn’t already begun to lose.

I set the tray down on the table near the armchair without speaking. The scent of roasted chicken and herbs fills the room, subtle but rich. The kind of food no prisoner expects. She doesn’t move toward it. Doesn’t so much as glance at it. She’s not ready to accept what this place is. Or what I am.

I step closer.

She looks small here. Curled into herself, drowning in the black shirt I gave her, her hair tangled, her mouth pressed into a line that betrays how hard she’s trying not to shake. But her eyes—those defiant, furious eyes—they never leave mine.

There’s something in them that dares me to get closer.

I do.

I stop a foot from the bed. Just close enough that she has to tilt her chin up to meet my gaze. Her pulse thrums visibly at the base of her throat. She’s trembling now, but she hides it well. Every part of her screams defiance, but her body betrays her. The fear is there. Buried deep, carefully caged.

“You haven’t eaten,” I say.

Silence.

I reach for the chair beside the bed and pull it closer, the legs scraping faintly against the floor. She flinches at the sound but doesn’t speak. I sit down slowly, letting the tension settle thick between us. I lean back just slightly, studying her. Not like a man studies a woman—but like a hunter watches something wild, just barely cornered.

I wait.

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